I know that this is YOUR story, but according to several Hercules and Xena episodes the Gods (or at least Hercules, Aphrodite and Ares) are still alive (and in areal twist Hercules uses the alias Kevin Sorbo and plays himself in a TV show).

Poor Ares! I never thought I would feel sorry for the God of War. Good story!

Thanks for staying with the story. And thanks for the kind words.

Why do I think Dawn's help is not going to go how Willow thinks it will. Good part!

Kind of, but stay tuned. : - )

Interesting! I wonder if that was really her or someone else?

Either way, cool!

It was Hecate. Either her or a REALLY good goddess imposter .

Leave it to Willow to come up with a plan! I hope it works. Good part.

Thanks.
Willow's had some bad press sometimes. But she still is a perennial favorite, and ever the optimist.

"You brought a god of WAR?! HERE?!"

LOL very nice bridge part and a nice way to end it.

Thanks.
I kind of liked it myself. It sounds to me like something Giles would certainly say.

I gotta love the "why I'm not too worried about Ares on the loose" speech!

Good ol' Buffy -- ever the optimist!!

really nice part. Can't wait for the you to continue it!

Thanks.

This is one of those stories that seem to take longer to write than I'd like, but unfortunately this thing called LIFE gets in the way sometimes. I have the ideas, but finding time to put them down can be a bit of a problem. But I keep plugging away at it.

I'm really enjoying the "old-age world for retired gods" bit (reminds me a bit of one of Tom Holt's humorous novels, ODDS AND GODS, which starts out in the "Sunnyvoyde Home for Retired Deities" where all the old, wheelchair-bound, and sometimes incontinent gods of mainly defunct pantheons are eager to escape from their nurses' care!), plus the opportunity to see what a weakened and aged Ares might do in the modern world (unlike the young and strong Ares we saw in the occasional "contemporary" episodes of Hercules and Xena, culminating in "Soul Possession").

Somehow, I think Tara's right on the money that Ares is ultimately going to be up to no good, but as he once told Xena in season 6, like the proverbial scorpion crossing a river, he can't change his god-of-war nature. It's a tribute to Kevin Smith's acting legacy, that Ares STILL manages to be a sympathetic character, nonetheless.

But now that Xena and Gabrielle are reunited in Buffy's house, I expect much fun to ensue!

Ares was my fourth XWP fave (behind Gabrielle, Xena and Callisto). A mischief maker for sure. Wonder how he's going to like the wars in this future world.

Thanks.

Okay, I've come to the conclusion that someone must have been slipping Buffy and the Scoobies some heavy duty stupid pills. I mean, come on; Buffy decides she wants to make friends with an ancient warrior princess who almost killed her, so she a) goes to an extra-dimensional old gods retirement home to seek the aid of the god of war, b) returns with said war god by promising to find him some new worshippers, c) when it proves too difficult to send Buffy back, they follow the war god's suggestion and bring the warrior princess forward without any consideration of ethics or practicality, and d) when their unwilling guest objects to leaving her friend behind, they agree to let the war god "borrow" the powers of the group's magic users to bring the friend forward too. Forget the stupid pills, I'm beginning to think Ares must have set this whole thing up from the beginning by casting a contagious geas on Buffy before sending her back. Somebody better get hit upside the head with a clue-bat and fast before it's too late. (Perhaps one wielded by an actor with the initials KS? Demi-dues ex machina? ;) )

Just to be clear, I'm not complaining about the writing of this story, just the extremely unlikely behavior of the Scoobies. While Buffy does have a history of making some questionable choices at times, by season 5 the Scoobies were no longer sufficiently in awe of her to just let her have her way. And yet, with a few minor objections that seemed more form than substance, that's just what they did. Since Ares has been shown in the past to be somewhat less than trustworthy, I'm hoping that their OOC behaviour can be explained by his influence.

I'm not really sure how to respond to this review.
On the one hand you rated this story an 8, which I appreciate.
But on the other hand you pick apart and criticize almost every scenario of the story.
Of course, Buffy used poor judgement, and dragged Willow and Tara along with her (one point of the story), and so it will be up to her and Xena (mostly) to correct this. As Spike has said, magic always has consequences. As Buffy and the others are finding out.
All I can say is stay tuned. Buffy and Xena almost always prevail. Maybe they will get lucky this time too.

So they are in the future! I still don't Ares as far as I can throw him!

Can't wait for more.

Somethings you can count on. One is that the gods, ANY god, wil have his own agenda. And two -- well, I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

Thanks for the review.

Oops, so much for that second chance. Xena isn't going to be any too happy that Gabrielle got left behind like that. And Ares had better watch himself. Xena could come close to beating him back when he was in his prime, so if he's really that weakened and he makes her mad, he's toast.

Well, you see, what happens is ....
Nope, can't do it. No spoilers.
But she isn't real happy.

Oh so this is going to fun, Xena in america! Can't wait for more!

Thank you.
More to come, for sure.

Never ever trust him! AHHH! Buffy!

Good work!

Some people just have to learn the hard way.

The School of Hard Knocks is alive and thriving over the Hellmouth.

So, I take it that you aren't accepting the "present day" of the Gods as shown on Xena/Hercules? That's ok, since they were rather silly (if entertaining) episodes. It will be interesting to see where you take this. =]

Hadn't even thought about them. Different Buffy/Xenaverse.